Cracker Jack!

Jackson had his 5 year well-check this morning and all is well (nice play on words). He measured in at 40.5 inches tall and 37 pounds. Another peanut...that put him in the 10% for height and 20% for weight. Amazing, considering he was in the 40-50% just last year. I swear I feed my kids! If anyone saw Jack eat, you'd think he'd weigh at least 50 pounds by now. But Dr. Hansen wasn't concerned, and neither am I. I think Jack is doing really well this year and I'm just excited he's been so healthy. After talking a bit about Jack's history w/the dr. we decided to do another allergy test - this time a blood draw. Mainly because he had some small things show up on his test a few years ago, but nothing definitive. I also mentioned how when he eats ranch dressing, if it gets on his face he gets hives. That was enough for him to want another test done, so off to the hospital for that. Jack rocks though, just a few tears, no screaming or fighting it. I even had him look once the blood started to go in the small tube and into the vial and his exact words were "that's cool" said in the middle of his tears. He's so cute. Good boy.

So a funny story, and you know if Jack's involved there's going to be a funny story. The nurse took us back to do the height and weight check. Jack thought the scales were cool and he wanted to count all the stickers on both of them. Then we had to go into the bathroom and he had to pee in a cup...okay - you'd think this is where the story comes in, but no. He thought it was funny and commented on how he had a lot in his cup - he was proud. After that we went over to do the eye chart. The nurse asked him some questions about shapes and then pointed to the chart and had him identify each symbol line after line. About the third line down there was the shape of a crescent moon. She asked him what that was and he said "chrysalis" so matter of factly the nurse looked at him like "huh?" With his lisp I don't think she understood what he said so I repeated it. She literally bent over laughing - and I said "can you tell what they've been talking about in preschool?" We laughed for a second and then she continued to the chart with colors on it...a green line and a red line (I was actually interested in his response since my dad is colorblind). She pointed to the green line and without missing a beat Jack's response was "verde." I thought - here's where we see if miss nurse can follow it...she giggled a minute, and then pointed to the red line and of course Jack said "roho." At this point a few nurses had stopped and watched all of it and they were all giggling at Jack. One asked "what preschool does he go to? I think my niece needs that school!" I thought they were joking so I laughed along. A minute later the nurse comes into our room w/a pen and paper and said "so what school does he go to?" Wow.

All in all it was a good appointment. Jack really seemed to like Dr. Hansen, so that makes us feel good about switching. I just could drive 45 minutes back up north to Dr. Flannery even though we really loved him. I just pray Brian's appointment goes as well on Friday...(I'm scared!)

Can You Say CUTE!!??

Okay, I know, I'm his mom and I'm biased - but come on - you tell me this isn't just the cutest little man you've ever seen!? Okay, so you might tell me he isn't, but I bet he's the cutest you've seen today! These jammas used to be Jack's, and I had gotten them for him at the consignment sale a few years ago. I loved Jack in them so much I almost didn't give them to Brian because they were kind of a special memory for me. But Dave gave him a bath tonight and decided to put them on him and comb his hair just so, and then call me up to see this sweet little thing. Oh how my heart just melted!!! How is one mom so lucky to have two such adorable boys! Seriously - teenage years are going to be worrisome! Oh those poor dads of little girls (oh wait a minute - we have one of those too!) I'm sure we'll have our worries on both sides of the equation.
Anyway - I just had to share his cuteness with all of you. Enjoy!

Blasted!!!

On Halloween, I wanted to carve one more pumpkin for our front porch. The kids were at school and Dave was home so I grabbed a pumpkin left over from Jack's party and got ready to carve. We had a bunch of those carving kits you can get with patterns and all the tools you need. Well I knew what I wanted to carve so all I needed was the marking crayon that came in the kit. I couldn't find one anywhere. We had three during the party and I know we kept the kits pretty well accounted for so I assumed they had to be somewhere. I asked Dave if he had seen them and he said he hadn't. Oh well, no biggie. So I use a regular crayon hoping it works as well, which it does not, but I get the job done. Now I was ready to do some carving! I knew Dave had put the carving pieces and the scoopers in the dishwasher so I opened it up to get what I needed. And holy sweet savannah to my eyes what did I see? A totally GREEN dishwasher!!!! Can you figure out how???? It took me a minute, but then I realized what happened - I know where the marking crayons were - or in this case where they had melted onto everything!!! I'll spare the details of how it happened to shield my loved ones... It was actually funny for a bit, until we realized that a simple rewashing of things didn't clean it up, nor did many loads empty on hot, or using vinegar, or this or that...we tried everything. We had lost most of the kids cups, utensils, our plastic cups and bowls, and lots of gladware. It was a disaster. We had pretty much given up hope and were looking at homedepot.com for a new dishwasher, which totally sucked because we hadn't even paid off this one yet (it's only 6 months old - we decided to trade out the builder's dishwasher for one that actually cleaned our dishes and didn't sound like a jet engine in our kitchen). It was nauseating for me to even think about doing that, so I decided I wouldn't consider it until I knew I had exhausted every possible cleaning idea out there. Well we found a suggestion on some message board about this cleaner called "Bar Keepers Friend" but you can't just go to the grocery store and buy it. At least not our grocery store. But their website said Linens 'n Things sells it, among others. I immediately went in and bought two cans of this stuff, plus some dish gloves and scrub brushes. I figured I'd rather spend $30 dollars on cleaning products that might work instead of replacing a $900 dishwasher. Just a thought. I get home and I'm so anxious to see if this stuff works I barely follow the instructions. It just has to work!!! So I make my paste and start scrubbing. Immediately the cleaner starts to turn green - it's coming off!!! I continue to scrub and scrub and scrub - I went through all the cleaner I had bought and had to go get more. It didn't matter though, it was working! In the end I spent over 6 hours inside my dishwasher, but it's saved! Unfortunately a lot of it is stained green still, but the waxy film is gone and the green doesn't rub off on anything we put in it. I felt very thrifty in putting so much effort into it, because believe you me, I sooo did not want to do that much work when first thinking about our options. Most of me wanted to just say heck with it and go get a new one. But when I thought long and hard about our current financial status - not such a great idea to go into more debt just so I didn't have to use a little elbow grease! Can you say lazy!? Geesh. Obviously we made the right choice. It'll be a fun story to tell at parties and such in the future (once a certain someone can embrace the humor in his error ;-).

Below are a few pictures to elaborate the story. Unfortunately, in our panicked state we didn't think to take a complete before picture - with the overwhelming amount of green in there - dishes and all. It was quite a sight!

Halloween Pics

I won't take up much time but wanted to post the kids' halloween pics. Emma was Snow White, Brian was a cute dragon, and Jack was Thomas. I still can't believe we made it this long w/o him wanting to be Thomas. The kids had fun and the neighborhood was just the right size for our kids. Big enough to feel like they were out for a while, but not too big where we were walking all evening. I'm sure next year will feel different when more houses are built. Enjoy the pics!